Do Your Adverts Work For You?? – Conclusion

During my mini-series of 3 articles on how to write well performing adverts, I focused on the the headline, the body copy and finally, the call to action. Essential ingredients for every advert and sales letter.

In this conclusion, I wanted to make sure that you understand they are not the only elements that can raise the success of a campaign.

For example. You need to know how each advert is performing so that you know whether to increase it’s size and frequency, or if it flops and you need to ditch it and try another. The easiest way to do this is to log each enquiry that you receive. Ask your callers where they saw the advert, include a code if your advert sent people to a website to order something and track the results. This is vital so that you do not waste any more money on adverts or letters that don’t perform well.

Try including some testimonials if you have enough space. Make it company policy that every time a customer or client says something good about your business/service, you thank them for the compliment and ask if you can use it on your website. Do it as soon as they say it so you can also capture their excitement and wonder. If you leave it a few days, they may still agree but it will not be as strong as it was. Make it easy for people to give you a testimonial. Immediately ask them if you can put their comment into an email and send it to them for checking. All they need to do is reply to the email and say yes.

Make the testimonials real by including the person’s name, their job title and general location. If you ask this immediately they are unlikely to say no because you are responding to their flattering comment with one of your own, asking if you can use their name on your website for the whole world to see.

Testimonials can boost the effectiveness of an advert or sales letter by many times because people can see that others have tried and tested you and your service out and it worked well. They can ask to see the original testimonials as well to give even more credence. It helps to remove any doubts the reader may have about trusting you.

Lastly, include a strong, and real, 100% money back guarantee in your literature. This has the effect of lifting the last remaining risk from the new customer. If they are not totally blown away by your product/service, if they are not astounded by your customer service, if they are not 110% happy with everything, they will not owe you a penny. Any money already paid will be immediately and fully refunded with no inquisition and no hassle. There will always be a few who exercise this refund option, but it is only a small minority of people and will be far outweighed by the extra customers having that guarantee will bring.

I trust you have found this mini-series of articles on adverts useful.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or comments – both good and bad. I will answer them all.

I am a qualified Certified Practising Accountant having passed my final exams way back in 1981. I actually can’t believe that was 37 years ago!! Anyway, I am now in my 60’s and I have been running my own business since May 1983. And before you ask, no, I have never regretted a moment of it!
Part of the membership requirements of my professional body now dictate that I spend quite a lot of time on “CPD” - continuing professional education (one of their better ideas) - and over the last two years I decided to study business growth and marketing.
I have learnt such a lot and that knowledge has radically changed my old “accountants” approach to business. It has made such a difference to the way I work and operate I feel that I just have to pass on this knowledge. It is simply too powerful to hold back!! - but I will try and do it in simple terms rather than expecting you to spend hours, as I had to, working through the difficult language that trainers seem to use to pass on their concepts.
I hope you find the blog a useful resource and interesting place to visit as the months pass. I will do my best to keep up the flow - but if there are any topics you would like me to cover, then please let me know.
Ray Stewart